When my kids were young, I was one of those moms that just loved doing all sorts of domestic and creative things. I have been called “June Cleaver,” though I am not fond of wearing high heels or pearls or even dresses for that matter. (In one episode, the dedicated June wore pearls even with her bathrobe! I saw it on a rerun!)

I always made a point of taking time for friends, church, and community. I had other pursuits, hobbies, and interests. But there’s no doubt that my family was my first focus. Caring for my kids and participating in their lives was a major part of my life.

When my oldest kids started leaving home, I knew I was in for a tumble down the empty nest syndrome spiral. I could see the writing on the wall: one day all of my children would be out on their own. So I took the bull by the horns and started preparing for that day far in the future when I really would be an empty nester.

I thought about things I’d like to do when all the kids were grown. I knew I’d relish more time to write and follow other creative pursuits. I could get a job in publishing. I could go back to school and finish my degree. And I expected to someday have grandkids to coddle, spoil, and enjoy.

My hubby, Jim, and I could do more traveling, take longer vacations, and make more weekend getaways. We’d continue to visit art galleries and enjoy community theater and music. I even told Jim I would learn to golf, but was secretly glad when he said he prefers to golf with “the guys.”

Jim and I sat down and wrote individual and combined 5-year and 10-year goals—what we’d like to do by then and where we’d like to see ourselves. I guess we were writing bucket lists before we knew what a bucket list was. As the years went by, we checked some things off, crossed out some that no longer seemed interesting, and repeatedly highlighted some that just hadn’t happened yet.

One thing on my list was to have chickens. I finally got my chickens shortly after Jim and I moved to the farm (checking one more thing off our lists). Guess what? It was just after our youngest child got married and began her own life outside my nest. And yes, I already had symptoms of the dreaded empty nest syndrome.

A week after we moved to the farm, our wonderful Maremma livestock guardian dogs came to live with us. But for a smooth transition, they needed some livestock to guard. So we got some chickens. Yay! At last!

I started with layer breed chicks…17 of them! A month later, I got meat chicks…26 of them! We had 43 chicks! And I thought, why not try raising turkeys for Thanksgiving? So I bought some turkey babies! We had…chicks and turkey poults galore.

I have to say I am surprised at how chickens have satisfied my maternal nurturing instincts. They don’t need a lot of care, but from the start, twice or more a day I was checking on them, feeding and watering them. Oh yes, and sometimes just watching them. And, okay--sometimes I even held and cuddled them.

I could tell you many wonderful things about chickens, but today I’m thinking about how they hopped into my empty nest and filled it pretty full.

I still miss my family when they’re not here. I enjoy doing little-kid things with my grandkids, and grownup stuff (okay, some childish stuff too) with my eight adult kids. I have been known to pamper Jim just a little eensy bit.

But those chickens, they let me lavish on them all the nurturing I have to spare. I’ve never once heard them complain!

Marie and her husband, Jim, are developing a farm in the Pacific Northwest with their adult children and grandchildren. At The Homesteader Kitchen Marie and her daughter review kitchen equipment and talk about preparing and preserving delicious food. Along with other family members, Marie shares glimpses of country life at Rural Living Today and teaches practical skills at The Homesteader School .

When Jim and I bought our first acreage, we were just shy of 30 years old. We both dug in and worked hard to make that land into a small farm for our family. We had all the energy in the world!

Jim was working full time in the city, and on weekends he was building fences, mending fences, planting fruit trees, tilling garden plots. I was a stay-at-home mom with three young kids, making our house a home, growing some of our food, and doing lots of domestic things “the old fashioned way.”

After that, life took us here and there for a few decades, and flash forward to today — we are now just shy of 60 years old. We are both digging in and working hard to make this land into a farm for our family. But guess what? We no longer have all the energy in the world!

We have enough, though. We are putterers and we like to stay busy — it seems to be in our genes. Neither of us lacks for ideas for more things to do around here. We just have to remember to pace ourselves and leave some tasks to our younger family members.

We keep an eye on each other and watch for telltale signs that we need a break or need to get help for something. We rarely miss our afternoon coffee date together, whether it’s in the living room, at the kitchen table, on folding chairs in the barn, or somewhere in our beautiful “backyard.” It forces us to sit down and even close our eyes for a spell.

Of course, our life would be different if our kids had not wanted to make this a joint family project. If it were just the two of us, Jim and I would be on 10 or 20 acres just outside a small town, not far from family, with a few chickens, a steer or two, a garden, and some fruit trees.

And truth be told, there would be a point at which we'd be too old to start even a small farm by ourselves. But since we are part of this extended family adventure, we are enjoying it to the hilt. Some of our heroes are elderly longtime farmers who have continued to tend their gardens, care for their livestock, and preserve their own food. They say they won't stop till "they buy the farm" or "the cows come home."

Several years ago Jim and I adopted a personal mantra from the movie “Far and Away.” You may know the story: Joseph and Shannon, played by Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, escape from their unfulfilling lives in Ireland and sail to America. Shannon’s parents, Daniel and Nora, come looking for their runaway daughter. All four of them end up in the Midwest during the Oklahoma Land Rush.

Daniel and Nora, a middle-aged couple, embark on a frantic (and comical) race to claim a piece of land. As they stand victoriously surveying their chosen prize, Daniel says tenderly to Nora:

“Let’s pretend we’re starting out instead of ending up.”  

Here’s to starting out … at any age!

Marie and her husband, Jim, are developing a farm in the Pacific Northwest with their adult children and grandchildren. At The Homesteader Kitchen (http://homesteaderkitchen.com), Marie and her daughter review kitchen equipment and talk about preparing and preserving delicious food. Along with other family members, Marie shares glimpses of country life at Rural Living Today (http://rurallivingtoday.com) and teaches practical skills at The Homesteader School (http://homesteaderschool.com).

I titled this blog “Adventures in Rural Living” because for our family, rural living has truly been an adventure.

We’ve lived on three rural properties and in several suburban and urban settings. By far, country living has offered the most challenges, as well as the most laughs for us and for our neighbors. Surprises — good and bad — seem to abound.

As time goes by, I’ll be sharing some of those highs and lows with you in detail, but today I’ll offer a brief glimpse at what I mean by the adventures of rural living.

• A cold morning displays a beautiful sunrise with long rays of sparkle glistening on fields of snow.
• A phone call from a neighbor informs you that your cows are in her yard — again.

• A bird’s nest with three delicate blue-green eggs is found on the tongue of your horse trailer.
• A piece of equipment breaks, requiring expensive repairs, and it turns out to be your own fault.

• A glance out the window reveals a doe and her fawn walking across your yard.
• A routine drive becomes a nightmare when your truck settles into a river of mud and turns on its side.

 
• A hen that disappeared a month ago walks out of the woods with a parade of baby chicks.
• A pleasant stroll makes your heart race when you see very fresh bear scat on your road.

• A visiting city child is awed by the opportunity to gather fresh eggs for his breakfast.
• A chimney fire has you worried when the fire department can’t find your house.

• A summer meal consists totally of foods you raised on your own property.
• A horse refuses to walk into the trailer when you are late for a 4H horse show.

• A grape picked on the day after the first frost is the sweetest thing you have ever, ever tasted.
• A frozen outdoor water spigot means hauling buckets of water from the house to the barn.

• A child tells you she would rather help you in the garden than watch television.
• A raccoon reaches through a hole in your chicken coop and leaves a laying hen with one wing.

• A tire swing on a gnarly old tree is the favorite toy of all the neighborhood kids.
• A tractor part breaks right in the middle of a big job on the only day you have time to do it.

• A cow in the pasture that was pregnant last time you looked suddenly has a wobbly calf standing at her side.

I’m ending with a positive point because the beautiful, exciting, and thrilling moments are some of the reasons we love rural living.

The other points? Those not-so-beautiful, unexciting, definitely not thrilling moments?

Well, we endure them. We survive them. We try to learn something from them. We hope they never happen again.

But we know they’re just part of the package.

Hello readers! My name is Marie, and I enjoy talking about the rural lifestyle. My husband, Jim, and I have always been “homesteaders at heart,” though most of our life has been spent in urban and suburban settings. We bought our first acreage in 1981, moved several times for job changes, and then found our “finally farm” in 2007.
 

Though they live elsewhere, our children and grandchildren share this slice of heaven with us. They come and go as they can, participating in farm projects and working on their own cabins and future home sites. Jim and I feel blessed to have great relationships with all our family members: the four that we raised, the four that married them, and our baker’s dozen of beautiful grandchildren.

Together we spent three years developing our property before Jim and I moved here full time in 2010. Gradually it’s all coming together. We now have a small home, a large utility barn, a chicken coop, and a garden shed/greenhouse. Two Maremma sheepdogs and a small flock of laying hens live on the farm all year long.

We raise meat chickens in the summer and have plans to add beef cattle and pigs to the mix. The family has planted an orchard which promises future fruits and berries. We have a nice sized vegetable garden and preserve some of our bounty by canning, freezing, and dehydrating. It’s a wonderful feeling to sit down to a meal that originated right here on the farm.

A family of adventurers, we like to try new and old methods of farming, gardening, and homemaking. Our parents and grandparents set examples for us, and we desire to live close to the land and be good stewards of it as well. Now we’re seeing another generation follow suit as even our young grandchildren jump right in and help with animals and gardens.

Our projects reveal the engineer here, the administrator there, and creativity in many forms. The complementary interests and skills of all eight adults result in a myriad of ideas. We win some and lose some, with our share of projects that worked better in our heads than in real life. But we also see many successes and have a lot of fun.

Though the farm chores and other activities keep us busy, I always make time for writing. With other family members I review kitchen equipment at The Homesteader Kitchen and share practical how-to’s at The Homesteader School. We also offer encouragement and tips for the urban-to-rural transition at Rural Living Today.

And now I’ll be writing here at Grit about our journey along the rural roads of life. It’s truly an adventure, and I look forward to sharing it with you!